MAG Operations Committee

The MAG is represented by merchants dedicated to driving positive change in payments through multi-stakeholder collaboration. As the MAG matures and its scope expands to achieve its continued mission, we have created an Operations Committee represented by committee member subject matter experts with objectives to identify, prioritize, and execute strategies to improve payments operational challenges most relevant to MAG merchant members.

The Committee’s priorities are aligned towards reaching cost-effective and simplified payments operations that consider all channels, help merchants protect customers, and promote fairness in the ecosystem by:

Monitoring effectiveness of strategies and tactics and anything within the industry that may influence the outcome

Alignment and partnership with the Advocacy Committee interfacing with merchant trade associations and media to promote awareness of MAG payment operations priorities and representing member interests within trade press

The Committee identified Best Practices* that payments industry stakeholders should follow. These Best Practices fall within the following four major categories or themes:

Fundamentals include concepts that should be practiced by stakeholders in establishing rules, standards, and basic requirements for payment practices that support customer authentication, fraud mitigation, and equitable incentives among stakeholders.

Digital covers practices in the mobile, online, contactless, and other digital channels or products that enable merchant choice of acceptance and transparency around rules and 3rd party wallet practices such as data use, security, cost, and customer experience. These best practices also call for changes in pricing, process, rule (chargeback), fraud, and specification practices related to the digital payment environment.

These Best Practices* were shared with our primary MAG Elite Brand and Acquirer sponsors in 2016 with a request to provide a response plan to critical path priorities. To date we have been able to achieve success on the following operational interests.

The Committee continues to focus on driving forward the priorities highlighted within these Best Practices* (in red). In order to deliver on continued momentum, it is imperative to have active support and participation from subject matter experts in the merchant community that deal with these ongoing operational challenges on a daily basis. Whether it be challenges related to fraud mitigation efforts, chargeback processes, network rules, proprietary technologies vs. open standards, payments technology certification requirements, authentication strategies, debit routing services and solutions, equitable liability and risk, adequate data security, transparency in costs, or parity among the commerce channels, a collective effort will be the most successful.

Contact Laura Townsend if interested in joining the MAG call to action to improve operational challenges that inhibit the successful progression of payments and commerce or to bring awareness to the Operations Committee of any emerging challenges your organization is experiencing the MAG should prioritize.

*Document is for MAG members only. If you are a MAG member, click on the orange Account Login button located in the upper right hand corner to view this content. If you are receiving an error message upon clicking on an item, it’s because you are not currently a MAG member or you are not logged in. If you need help with your login credentials please contact MAG staff at info@merchantadvisorygroup.org.

*Document is for MAG members only. If you are a MAG member, click on the orange Account Login button located in the upper right hand corner to view this content. If you are receiving an error message upon clicking on an item, it’s because you are not currently a MAG member or you are not logged in. If you need help with your login credentials please contact MAG staff at info@merchantadvisorygroup.org.